'I never, never in my life say so many things like tonight. I'm going to tell you which underwear I am wearing.'
De vrouw die Valentino Garavani opmerkelijk eerlijke uitspraken wist te ontlokken is de Amerikaanse Fern Mallis, voormalig uitvoerend directeur van de Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) en oprichtster van de New York Fashion Week. Voor haar Fashion Icons-serie interviewt ze on stage levende legendes uit de modewereld. We verzamelden de meest opmerkelijke citaten uit het interview met Valentino.
Over verwend zijn als kind: 'Spoiled?
I don't know, I thought that I must have all my clothes custom-made—and
my mother agreed. I had to have my shoes custom-made too.'
Over zijn beslissing als 17-jarige naar Parijs te verhuizen: 'I
told my parents I wanted to move to Paris, then when someone asked to
go to Paris it's like today if a kid asked their parents to go to the
moon.'
Over zijn signature color: 'I went to
Barcelona dressed to see a designer and they invited me for the opening
of the Opera House...and I was really attracted by the red color so I
said one day when I am going to be a designer I will put red as my lucky
color—and I did.'
Over Jackie Kennedy: 'The first
show I did in Rome, when I first arrived, I designed entirely of evening
gowns thinking about Jackie Kennedy, though I had never met her at the
time.'
Dit was de modeklassieker waar Jackie Kennedy niet zonder kon >
Over haar tweede huwelijk: 'She
wore one of my dresses to her wedding to Aristotle Onassiss...she owned
it already from my collection, it was already sitting in her closet.
The most amazing thing happened, one month after the wedding we sold
over 30 orders of the same dress, which was amazing because it was high
fashion.'
Over zijn favoriete model: 'Gisele for me, she is the top of the top.'
Over Elizabeth Taylor: 'Elizabeth
Taylor was in Rome for one year to shoot Cleopatra. While there she
heard I was a new designer and asked to see my clothes so we went to
villa with my designs and there she was—she was still Mrs. Fisher at the
time—she said she needed an evening gown for a movie opening. She was
very demanding...she only would take a picture with me if I promised to
give her a gown. I said, 'Choose one that you like,' and of course she
chose the most expensive one.'
Over zijn minst favoriete modedecennium: 'I
hated the '80s fashion, looking back at my collections I hated my
dresses, they were out of proportion—the shoulders too big, the hair was
terrible, the shoes were no good. I never liked it. I always loved the
'40s, '50s and '60s.'
Over de manier waarop vrouwen zich vandaag kleden: 'They are very beautiful but I am not so enchanted by people dressed in all black—which I've seen in the street.'
Over zijn eerste zomer in Saint Tropez: 'I've
always been a big dreamer because I love beauty—sorry I keep coming
back to that—to see all those yachts, they were not that big to me, they
seemed very tiny. I was dreaming about yachts. And god gave me the
satisfaction of having my own yacht one day.'
Over zijn liefde voor honden: 'Animals, this to me are the best thing in the world—after human beings of course.'
Over zijn leven: 'I
think I was the happiest and luckiest and most fortunate person in the
world...I don't regret one second to be what I was because I had the
most beautiful and enjoyable time in the world.'
Gezien? De bodyguard van Karl Lagerfeld is knap én grappig >
